


Your Words on my Skin

by pathera



Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, F/F, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Identity Reveal, M/M, Poor Life Choices, Secret Identity, Soulmate-Identifying Marks
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-07-25
Updated: 2017-04-21
Packaged: 2018-04-11 02:51:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,454
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4418282
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pathera/pseuds/pathera
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Foggy has imagined his soulmate a lot over the years, but to be honest he never pictured the mask. </p><p>That's what he got though, the Devil of Hell's Kitchen who has an annoying habit of disappearing every time Foggy tries to talk him. Trying to work out a relationship with a vigilante is complicated at best, as Foggy is finding out. And then he meets Matt Murdock, who is amazing and gorgeous and perfect, and Foggy would probably be head over heels for him if he wasn't already half in love with the man in the mask. </p><p>As it turns out, this might be more complicated than it seems.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. I.

**Author's Note:**

> This is a WIP because I suck. No, seriously guys, I SUCK, run away right now I do not write long things because I am so bad at finishing them. That being said, I've got this planned out for either five chapters and an epilogue or six chapters, but it has a plot that I am in such a fight with and could easily be longer or shorter. It's also going to be a series; at the very LEAST there will be a companion piece from Matt's point of view but I would not put it past Fisk, Vanessa, and Wesley to hijack their own story and run away with it. 
> 
> I don't _think_ there are any big warnings for this, besides idiots in love and poor life choices and sass, so much sass, but if any come up I'll definitely update the tags and mention it in future notes. 
> 
> The first two chapters of this are posted [here](http://daredevilkink.dreamwidth.org/1742.html?thread=3091662#cmt3091662) on the kinkmeme but I'll be updating it here if I can beat the next chapter into submission. The original (beautiful) prompt is:
> 
> I love soulmate stories where everyone has the first words their soulmate will say to them written somewhere on their skin. So here's what I'm thinking:
> 
> Matt and Foggy meet (they didn't meet in college -- Foggy went to Harvard, or something) and they exchange words, but there's a problem: Matt is dressed as Daredevil when they do this.
> 
> He wants to trust his soulmate, but he's only just met this man who may be his soulmate but is also a stranger, and so he doesn't tell Foggy who he is. A little while later, Matt and Foggy meet while Matt is Matt (in court?), and sparks fly but Foggy wants his soulmate and Matt wishes that this was their first meeting.
> 
> Cut to Foggy and Matt-as-Matt's developing friendship and Foggy and Matt-as-Daredevil's developing "something" and then... comes the reveal. Cue much angst and all the feels and -- most importantly -- a happy ending.

i. 

“Look,” Foggy says, his hands up and his voice as soothing as he can manage. This is his _I’m trustworthy, talk to me so I can help you_ lawyer voice. He knows because he practices it, although it usually isn’t as shaky as it is right now. “It’s fine, we’re good, okay?”

The voice doesn’t seem to be having the desired effect on the two guys who dragged him into the alley. The big one doesn’t look like he actually understands, or maybe that furrowed brow of confusion is his constant expression. The smaller one is twitchy, a ring of sweat staining the collar of his shirt, and he’s got a switchblade in his hand that jerks through the air every time he shifts his weight.

“We’re cool,” Foggy says, “you can have whatever you want, just—nobody wants to get hurt, okay man?”

“Your wallet,” the twitchy one grits out and Foggy nods.

“Yeah, sure,” he says. He lowers his hands slowly, fumbling while he draws his wallet out of his pocket. He holds it out carefully and the big one snatches it, while the smaller one jabs his switchblade forward, making Foggy jerk back.

“Watch too,” he says, and Foggy nods because his mouth is too dry for him to talk. He tries to get the clasp open, but he’s shaking too much to do it. The twitchy one makes a sound somewhere between disdain and frustration and grabs Foggy’s wrist, yanking at the watch.

Foggy should stay still and just let him, he knows that, but he’s scared and he just goes on instinct. He pushes the guy back and scrambles towards the entrance of the alley, stumbling over god knows what on the ground, and it’s a lost cause anyway because the big dude is surprisingly fast, grabbing him by the scruff of the collar like a kitten and throwing him against the wall. It knocks the breath out of him and he slams his head hard against brick, but he lurches forward anyway, because this has gone bad, this has gone so bad—and he slams straight into the twitchy man, whose twitchy switchblade goes right into Foggy’s side and oh, so _this_ is what being stabbed feels like.

Foggy doesn’t really follow what happens next, mostly because his brain is trying to process STABBED and is having difficulties with the concept. He does know that a figure in black comes dropping out of the sky, tearing the twitchy man away from him, and then there is motion, there is a lot of motion and painful sounds and the two men are flat out on the ground. Then there’s a dude in a black mask staring at Foggy. At least, Foggy assumes he is staring, because there aren’t any eyeholes in the mask, but he’s definitely turned towards Foggy as if he were staring.

STABBED, Foggy’s brain reminds him, in big flashing lights with sirens and a shit-ton of pain on top of it.

“Well this hurts,” Foggy hears himself say, and then he, well, he does not swoon, but he does maybe go a little woozy on his feet and careen backwards, and the man in black is there to steady him.

“It’s okay, I’ve got you,” the man says, and proves it when Foggy’s legs give out on him and he starts to buckle, taking Foggy’s weight easily and keeping them both upright. Foggy clutches at him, a) because he’s bleeding and his head hurts and hello legs, now is _not_ the time for this and b) because he’s been waiting since he was fifteen to hear those words come out of somebody’s mouth but this is really the last thing he ever expected. “I’m going to have you sit,” the man in black says, “okay?”

Foggy nods and wow, that was an awful idea, nodding is something he should never do again. The man eases him to the ground, propping him against the wall, and then crouches next to him. “I’m going to check that wound, all right?” the man says. Foggy mumbles something that is close enough to a yes and then holds his breath as the man peels his shirt gently away from the wound, prodding lightly at it. He hisses and the man winces in sympathy. “It didn’t hit anything major,” the man says finally, covering it back over with the shirt. He takes one of Foggy’s hands, pressing it against the wound. “Hold pressure there,” he orders. “An ambulance will be here soon.” Despite the order he leaves his hand over Foggy’s, pushing down firmly as if to make sure it’s done right.

It hurts like a sonofabitch, so Foggy tries to focus on anything else. The man’s face, for example. The mask obscures everything but the lower half of his face, but Foggy can see stubble and a mouth. Good stubble though, not the patchy, weird fuzz that some people have. And a nice mouth. Like, a really nice mouth. That’s his soulmate’s mouth.

“You know,” Foggy says, “I never pictured the mask.”

The man’s lips twist in amusement and Foggy feels a little bit better. Not a lot, because hey, he’s still been stabbed and probably has a concussion and his soulmate is a mask-wearing vigilante, but at least he’s a vigilante with a sense of humor.

“Do your words really say…hell, what did I even _say_?”

The man grins now, just a little, but it’s the kind of grin that Foggy wants to see every day for the rest of his life. “Well this hurts,” the man says, his voice rueful, and it hurts like a bitch to laugh but Foggy does it anyway, because _seriously_ , this could only happen to him.

Foggy can hear sirens now, loud as they draw closer, and the man in the mask’s head turns towards the entrance of the alleyway. The man’s jaw clenches. ‘Keep pressure,” he says, pressing meaningfully against the hand he has on top of Foggy’s over the wound, and then he draws his hand away. Foggy keeps that hand where it’s doing the vital job of keeping blood more or less inside his body, but with the other he grabs for the man’s arm, catching his sleeve. The man goes still, his body taut.

“You’re leaving,” he says, and he shouldn’t be as afraid of that as he is. Soulmate or not, this is a vigilante who beat the crap out of two men as if they were tissue paper, Foggy should be wary of him at best. He is wary of him; who knows who is under that mask or what he’s like or why he’s decided to run around the city in a mask? They’re going to need to have a long discussion about all of this. 

But it’s a discussion they can’t have if he just up and disappears into the night. Foggy will never see him again, and _that_ scares him.

There are flashing lights at the entrance of the alley and Foggy can hear the screech of wheels coming to a stop. The Devil of Hell’s Kitchen—because of _course_ that’s who it is, Foggy has heard the rumors, he reads the papers, there are only so many masked vigilantes running around this part of the city—frowns and gently peels Foggy’s fingers free from his sleeve. “I have to,” he says. “You’re safe now, you’ll be okay.”

Foggy makes a face, because that is not his concern, but he doesn’t have the time or the words to say _you can’t just **disappear** on me, that’s now how this is supposed to go_. Maybe the Devil understands anyway, because he squeezes Foggy’s hand and says “I’ll see you again” like a promise before scrambling up a fire escape and onto a roof, just as a police officer begins cautiously down the alley.

“Hey,” Foggy says when the cop gets close enough. He would wave, but there is a lot of pain going on right now and a lot of muscles that just do not want to listen to him and it’s possible that he’s going into shock. “I’ve kind of been stabbed. Can I get a little help?”


	2. II.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Foggy eats jello, Marci is not helpful, and Matt is nowhere to be found.

ii. 

Marci comes clicking into Foggy’s hospital room on a pair of designer stiletto heels, just as he’s shoved a spoonful of jello into his mouth. She raises her perfectly groomed eyebrows at him and says, “You look like hell.”   
  
“I got  _stabbed_ ,” he says through his mouthful of jello. She does not look impressed, but then again Marci very rarely looks impressed by anything. He misses the days when she was looked at the world with wide-eyed starry wonder. (Those days, if they ever existed, were long before Foggy ever met her, but hey, he can dream.) “What are you doing here?”   
  
Her lips curl into something like a smirk. “Your mom called me,” she says, and Foggy groans. “She wanted me to check in on you, since you apparently kicked her out.” With one of her long fingernails—painted a pretty pale pink today, and the color is nice against her skin but it’s too innocent a shade for her—she prods at the pile of get well cards that have accumulated at his bedside. His mother is the answer to this as well, an explanation for why he has a  _pile_ of cards despite being in the hospital less than twenty-four hours.   
  
“I didn’t kick her out,” Foggy says plaintively, as if Marci cares at all. She is here, he knows, a) for the sweet triumph of being able to hold  _your mom called_ over his head and b) for the potential presence of hot doctors and nurses. Foggy decides that he is absolutely not going to tell her about the hot nurse who, while not assigned to him, keeps checking in every so often, clearly drawn by his charm.   
  
“That’s not what she said,” Marci says. “She was very distraught, Foggy bear. You should be nicer to her, after she had to hear about her son being stabbed through the grapevine instead of from you.”   
  
“I didn’t get a chance to tell her!” Foggy says. He wasn’t going to call her in the middle of the night to say ‘hey mom, I’m totally fine but I did get a little bit stabbed,’ but by the time he woke up in the morning she was already there, wringing her hands and trying to smuggle in a tray of deli meats and swinging between tears over his injuries and reproaches about the fact that he didn’t tell her. Her finding out, he has no doubts, is all Brett’s fault. Cops are apparently gossipy bastards, and Brett must have heard his name and then told  _his_  mom, who in turn called  _Foggy’s_  mom and somehow this has all boiled down to Marci plotting how best to use his situation to her advantage.   
  
_I met my soulmate_ , he considers telling her, because who else  _would_  he tell? It is a sad fact of his life that Marci is probably his best friend, one he has been trying to come to terms with ever since they broke up in law school, didn’t talk for about a week, and then she called him and idiot and he called her soulless and things went back to normal, only minus the sex. Well, mostly minus the sex.   
  
If he  _did_  tell her, he can picture the scene. Her eyes would go sharp and her mouth would purse a little and she’d mentally work her way through the possibilities. If it was one of the muggers, well, he would either not mention it at all or he would be complaining quite thoroughly. If it was a cop, paramedic, or someone at the hospital, chances are, they would be at his bedside right now, or if they were called away it still would have been the first thing out of his mouth. And, in due time, she would settle on the only other person he would have encountered through the night and she would smile like a shark and say  _the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen, Foggy? I didn’t know vigilantes were your style_. And she’d say it like a joke, almost like an insult, but she would be worried too, because a vigilante as a soulmate has so, so much potential to go wrong.   
  
He doesn’t tell her. Instead, he says, “I’m not comfortable with my mother having your phone number.”   
  
Marci gives him an amused  _tough shit, sweetie_  look. “When are they releasing you?”   
  
“Tomorrow,” Foggy says. “They just needed to keep me for observation, in case of infection. And for the concussion.” He resists the urge to poke at the bandages on his side, even though they itch.   
  
“Good, I’ll come pick you up,” she says, and Foggy looks at her suspiciously.   
  
“There’s a meeting that you don’t want to go to,” he finally says, his eyes still narrowed. She grins wide and stands, leaning in to smack a sticky kiss onto his forehead.   
  
“You always were a smart one, Foggy bear. See you tomorrow.”   
  
“I think I hate you,” he says as she saunters out. She ignores him, as she is wont to do. He tilts his head back against his pillows, gratified to find that his head doesn’t swim nauseatingly anymore when he tries it.  
  
“How are you feeling, Mr. Nelson?”   
  
Foggy lifts his head to find a nurse smiling at him.   
  
_My soulmate is the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen_ , his brain supplies, as if that is the correct answer to that question.   
  
He smiles back at her. “Just fine, thanks,” he says. She checks his vitals and bandages, quick and efficient, and when she is done she pats him on the arm.   
  
“Everything is looking good,” she says. “We’ll have you out in the morning and back to normal.”   
  
“Great,” he says.   
  
Normal, while his soulmate is out there somewhere jumping off rooftops or fighting bad guys or who knows what, Foggy is not up to date on the day-to-day activities of a vigilante. He holds his smile until the nurse leaves and then slumps back with a sigh.   
  
Normal. Sure. 


	3. III

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Foggy meets Matt, Foggy meets the Devil of Hell's Kitchen (again), and everything blows up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I AM THE WORST. 
> 
> I legitimately thought it had been about a year since I updated this. Then I looked at it and realized that it's been almost two years and no, seriously, I am the worst. This chapter robbed me blind in a back alley and I am so sick of looking at it, but it's finally done so here you go. 
> 
> This chapter revolves around episode 1.5 World on Fire and there are a few bits of dialogue that are lifted verbatim or just ever so slightly paraphrased because a different person needed to say the same basic thing. Sorry, not sorry. Also, the timeline is a little different, just go with it. 
> 
> Everyone reading this is the best and I promise it won't be two years before I update it again.

_iii._

In a manner of speaking, things do go back to normal.

Foggy heals. No heavy lifting for a couple of weeks, no contact sports, no overly strenuous activity—the nurse who discharges him adds the last with a quick flick of her gaze to Marci who, as promised, has taken advantage of the situation in order to get out of work. Foggy doesn’t even bother trying to explain that _no,_ this is _not_ that kind of relationship, because Marci would undo all of his sputtering denials with a pat on his knee and something like “oh, of _course_ we’ll take it easy sweetie,” said in her sugar-sweet tones of _lies_.

They do give him a prescription for the good drugs, so the first few days out of the hospital are spent in a happy haze that turns the world into a vat of marshmallows, softening the edges and dulling the stabbing (ha! stabbing, funny right?) pain in his side down to tolerable levels.

His colleagues all make an appropriate fuss over him, oohs and ahhs and _you poor thing_ as if they are not all secretly plotting how to turn this against him and oust him from favor. Landman and Zack is a pond full of great white sharks, all tumbling over each other searching for the fattest prey. Foggy, as Marci would put it—as Marci _has_ put it, usually straight to his face but also said behind his back on one or two occasions—is a happy seal swimming among them.

(Seals are predators too, okay, ask any marine biologist. Seals are adorable and they are also fast, slippery sonsofbitches who will chomp the hell out of some penguins and are not to be underestimated.

…Even if they _are_ common prey for sharks.)

Foggy goes to get his stitches taken out and is pleasantly surprised to see the hot nurse from the night he got stabbed heading his way. Claire is efficient and she smiles at his jokes as she works and once she has all the stitches out and pronounces him good to go she hesitates, glances over her shoulder, then scrawls her number on a piece of paper and slips it into his hands. Foggy takes it, of course, soulmate or no when a woman like Claire gives you her number you damn well take it.

“I knew you were flirting with me,” he says with a grin. “I’m just too irresistible, damn my boyish charm.”

She smiles, shaking her head. “Give me a call if you need a friend,” she says, and gives him a little wave as he leaves.

Foggy punches her number carefully into his phone and then never calls. He thinks about it sometimes, as the days stretch by, hovers over the call button, drafts painstakingly casual texts and discards them with a huff, because Claire was nice and he does need more friends who aren’t Marci and he desperately wants to talk to someone, but she’s not actually the person he wants to talk to and he knows it.

Every night, Foggy scans the rooftops as he walks through the city, searching for a figure in the dark, and he never sees a thing.

+

Foggy meets Matt Murdock on a Wednesday, a month after he gets stabbed, about two days after he has started to accept the idea that he will only ever know his soulmate as some half-mythical dangerous and elusive vigilante figure He’s going to spend the rest of his life with a google alert for the words _devil, hell’s kitchen, man in black, vigilante_ and one day he’s going to turn on a tv and see the headline _Devil of Hell’s Kitchen Dead_ blaring across every station. That’s the day he’ll find out his soulmate’s name, the same day his words burn black into his skin.

Not that he has given it much thought.

He and Marci are at the courthouse people-watching (aka. spying on other lawyers) before their trial begins. “Know your enemy,” Marci drawls, stretching as she surveys her surroundings. Foggy has seen the same look of lazy contemplation on the faces of lionesses in nature documentaries. Her mouth twists, probably from the cliché that just came out of it.

“I wasn’t aware that every other lawyer not from our firm was the enemy,” Foggy remarks. Marci gives him a _poor naïve child_ look that he easily ignores.

“Fresh blood,” Marci says, nodding at a man walking past, his cane clicking against the ground as he walks. “Matt Murdock,” Marci continues, “graduated the same year we did, Harvard, summa cum laude. Just opened his own firm in Hell’s Kitchen. Bleeding heart type,” she adds, “but I hear he’s good.”

“Do you have his shoe size too?” Foggy asks, raising her eyebrows.

Marci tilts her head in contemplation, eyes narrowed in Murdock’s direction. “Ten,” she says after a moment.

“I don’t know why I’m friends with you,” Foggy says, and Marci gives him a sharp grin.

“Ten and a half, actually,” a friendly voice says. Unnoticed, Murdock has curved his trajectory towards them and drawn up within earshot.

“Um,” Foggy says, and jumps up, almost tripping over himself. “Sorry—uh—hi.”

Murdock looks amused. Foggy gathers his composure and tries again. “Franklin Nelson, attorney for Landman and Zack. I’m holding out my hand,” he adds, doing just that. Murdock smiles, surprised and pleased, and shakes Foggy’s hand. His grip is firm and warm, his palms calloused.

“Matthew Murdock,” Murdock says, still smiling, and god his smile is _gorgeous_.

“Marci Stahl,” Marci interjects, her voice a bored drawl as she rises to her feet. “Also your competition,” she adds, as Murdock retracts his hand and grips the top of his cane loosely.

Murdock tilts his head faintly in her direction. “Are we competition?” he asks. “I didn’t know Landman and Zack went for lowly petty crime cases. Aren’t you more concerned with big cases?” His voice is light, turns shades darker over the word _big_ , a faint jab at them that lacks any real malice.

Marci makes a non-committal noise that means yes. “It’s been lovely chatting, Mr. Murdock, but we’re due in court.”

“Of course,” Murdock says, with a little nod. “It was a pleasure meeting you, Ms. Stahl, Mr. Nelson.”

“I’m sure we’ll see you around,” Foggy says. He’s not sure _why_ he says it, but he does.

Murdock’s lips curl up in a little smile. “I’m sure,” he agrees, and heads in the direction he had originally been going, while Foggy falls in step with Marci, who gives him a scrutinizing look that should probably worry him.

“We’ll see you around?” she says. Foggy can’t decide if her tone is despair at him or just resigned indifference. He shrugs, hoping it doesn’t look as helpless as it feels, and she just shakes her head before leading the way into the courtroom.

+

“We’ll see you around,” Marci says ominously the next day, and drops a file on Foggy’s desk. He raises his eyebrows at her as she folds her arms, glaring down at him, and he pulls the file closer.

“The suit against Tully?” he asks, flipping it open. Then, “oh.”

“Murdock picked it up,” Marci says. “He just called to arrange a meeting. He’ll be here in half an hour.”

Foggy frowns, reading through the file. “He could have a solid case if he pushes it through to trial,” he says.

“Which is why we’re not going to trial,” Marci says. “We get them to settle. The workmen were completing requested repairs and had to leave because the unsavory element of the building created an unsafe work environment. Easy as that.”

Foggy shifts in his chair. “That’s not true,” he says, and Marci looks down at him.

“Since when do we care about _true_? We’re here to win cases, Foggy. That’s our _job_.”

“I know our job, Marci,” Foggy says, and there’s enough of a snap in it to make her raise her eyebrows at him. He makes a face that is as akin to an apology as she is getting.

“Look,” Marci says, and her voice is marginally softer, “we’re doing this woman a favor. She gets a nice settlement and can move to a better place in the city. If Murdock is smart, he knows that it’s in her best interest to take the settlement and move on with her life. It should be nothing more than price negotiation.” She leans on his desk. “If you don’t think you can handle Murdock—“

“I can handle Murdock just fine,” he says.

Marci studies him, then nods. “Okay. Don’t even let him in the door, Foggy. Be a shark.”

“I’ve got it,” Foggy says.

+

He doesn’t have it.

Foggy meets Murdock in the lobby, armed with a pretty little speech about why a settlement is the best course for both sides, confident that the might of Landman and Zack behind him will be enough to give him the high ground in negotiation. Murdock is waiting by the front desk, looking perfectly at ease as if he is not in enemy territory. “Mr. Murdock,” Foggy says as he approaches, aiming for cool politeness.

Murdock turns in his direction. “Mr. Nelson,” he says evenly, no surprise in his voice. “I presume you are Armand Tully’s lawyer?”

“One of them,” Foggy agrees. “I’d say we could discuss the case upstairs, but it’s such a straightforward matter that there’s no point in wasting your time, Mr. Murdock. Your client can agree to a buyout or she can remain in an unsafe environment until she is evicted.”

Murdock tilts his head slightly but doesn’t say a word. Foggy takes it as a cue to keep talking.

“A construction crew was sent in to make requested repairs to the property and were unable to complete said repairs because they feared for their safety from the criminal element in the building,” he says. “We are offering a generous compensation that will allow your client to relocate and allow our client to complete renovations that are to everyone’s benefit.”

Murdock gives him a thin-lipped smile and Foggy has to clamp down the instinct to step back. It’s a dangerous smile, and Foggy knows that he has somehow gone awry, that he has stepped directly into the path of an avalanche.

It would be one hundred percent beautiful if it weren’t aimed at him.

“You seem to be under the impression that this can only end in one of two ways: with the tenants accepting your offer and leaving, or with the tenants leaving without accepting the payout,” Murdock says, his voice as even as if they were discussing the weather. “Given the length of time that these tenants have already withstood your client’s harassment and attempts to oust them, do you _really_ believe they will allow themselves to be driven out? Your client has no legal grounds for eviction, so short of physically—and illegally—removing these tenants from their rent-controlled homes, Armand Tully loses his condos. And when Tully loses his condos, your firm loses Tully.” Murdock tips his head. “Bad for business, isn’t it?”

Foggy is a professional, composed lawyer who absolutely does _not_ stand there and gape like a first-year law student. Murdock smiles at him, a flash of bared teeth this time, and oh-so pleasantly says “I’ll see you in court, Mr. Nelson,” before striding towards the door.

“I see that went well,” Marci says, catching a glimpse of Foggy’s face as he retreats to his desk.

“Shut up,” he says, and goes to bury himself under a mound of paperwork.

+

On Friday, Foggy fully intends to celebrate the start of his weekend with kung pao chicken and a six pack of the fancy beer that he could never afford as a broke law student. He is absolutely not going to think about a) his continually MIA vigilante soulmate or b) the way Matt Murdock smiled when he was essentially declaring war. He has spent far too much time thinking about the first, and has spent an uncalled for amount of time contemplating the second in the past few days, especially for someone who has found their soulmate, however inaccessible they may be.

(He got extra eggrolls as a preemptive reward for not thinking about the things he doesn’t want to think about, and he is going to enjoy every second of them.)

He’s walking home when a voice out of the darkness says, “This isn’t a safe part of town.”

Foggy absolutely does _not_ squeak like a frightened mouse and drop his bag of delicious, delicious take out as he jumps away from the mouth of the alley next to him. A passerby heading towards him on the sidewalk pauses, considers him carefully with a suspicious look, and then crosses the street to avoid him.

Foggy stares into the alley and can just barely make out the shape of a figure lurking in the darkness. He snatches up his bag of takeout, preparing to run and mentally apologizing to himself for how much it’s probably going to hurt his side, when the figure moves forward into a slant of light from the street.

“You _bastard_ ,” Foggy says with feeling.

It’s hard to tell with the mask, but he thinks the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen looks almost sheepish.

“I didn’t mean to scare you,” the vigilante says.

“Try not popping out of dark alleys,” Foggy says and it’s a little harsher than he intends but he’s jumpy and it’s been a _month_. A whole goddamned month of absolutely nothing, not even a get well card, Foggy got _stabbed_ and his soulmate didn’t even bother to check on him. “Where the _hell_ have you been?”

“I said I would see you again,” the Devil protests.

“It’s been a _month_ ,” Foggy says, and the Devil flinches a little bit. “Couldn’t you have dropped out of a dark alley a bit before this?”

“Sorry,” the Devil says.

Foggy shifts on his feet. “It’s not like I could find you,” he says. “You didn’t exactly stick around for the ‘trading information’ part of meeting your freaking _soulmate_ , and you’re not an easy person to find.”

The Devil tilts his head. “I’d hope not,” he says, “as that would defeat the purpose of the mask.”

Foggy sighs. “Everybody’s a wise guy,” he says, and catches the impression of a smile in the dim light. He takes a breath and finds himself suddenly unsure of what to say. He wants to pour his soul out, wants to step closer and say _hi, I’m Foggy, I’ve been waiting for you since I was fifteen and I want to know everything,_ he wants to know every secret and every detail and have this person under his skin, but he is staring at a man in a mask, at a man who is already twitching like he wants to run away, and Foggy isn’t about to offer up himself up on a platter, words on his skin or no words.

Finally, he settles for, “I’m Foggy.” Short, simple, classic.

“Foggy?” the Devil asks, with a curl of amusement threading through his voice. Foggy is used to it, you don’t have a name like his without getting used to the instant question.

“Franklin. Apparently I snore,” he says with a shrug. “It stuck.”

In the distance, the sound of a siren rises. The Devil lifts his head and takes a step back, deeper into the alley, and Foggy knows that this is it, he’s waited a month for this small sliver of a moment that is about to end. “Wait!” he says, and takes a step forward, his arm outstretched as if it would do any good. The Devil curves out of reach, and Foggy tries to pretend that small moment of rejection doesn’t hurt. The Devil does pause though, waiting, and Foggy will take whatever victories he can get. “At least give me a name,” he says. “So I don’t have to keep calling you the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen in my head. It’s a mouthful.”

The Devil frowns, then sighs, a soft exhale. “You can call me Mike,” he says, his voice reluctant.

Foggy folds his arms over his chest. “That’s not your real name,” he says, and the Devil— _Mike_ —shakes his head a little.

“No,” the man says, and then his head tips to the side and his mouth quirks up into a faint smile. “Well, Michael is my middle name.”

Foggy takes that nugget and squirrels it away, mentally building himself a little horde of facts that he can pour over obsessively later. “Are you going to disappear for another month?” he asks. “You know you can’t avoid me forever, right?”

“I have to go,” Mike says. He opens his mouth as if to add _I’m sorry_ , closes it without saying a word. He is a blur of dark motion, a clang of metal and low scrapes and soft breaths and then he disappears over the edge of the roof. (Foggy swears that he pauses, at the top. Swears that he looks back, for just a moment.)

The sirens are getting closer and Foggy doesn’t stick around to see what they might be. He goes home and microwaves his now-cold dinner and he eats his extra eggrolls even though he is _definitely_ thinking about one of the the people he’s not supposed to be thinking about.

When Hell’s Kitchen erupts into flames later that night Foggy is close enough for his windows to rattle in time to the explosions, far enough away that he can only see the fire blooming bright against the dark sky and nothing of the destruction itself. There is a sick, thudding feeling low in his chest when he stares at the flames. He turns the news on, low volume, lets the reports wash over him and drown out the pounding of his heartbeat in his ears.

Foggy has no doubts about where his soulmate is, not tonight, not right now. He can close his eyes and see the sharp line of a jaw, the slant of a smile that he saw only a few hours ago, and he thinks, _was that a goodbye? Did you know, Mike?_

Foggy stares out the window and wonders, _did you do this?_

The city burns and Foggy stays awake all night, staring at the words curling around the calf of his leg, waiting for them to burn black against his skin and praying that they don’t.


End file.
